Jonathan Haskel (QMUL, CeRiBA, ONS), Denise Hawkes, Sonia Pereira

Skills and productivity in the UK using matched establishment, worker and workforce data

Using matched plant level skills/productivity data we document (i) more productive firms hire more skilled workers (e.g. top decile productivity plants hire workers with, on average, 2 years extra schooling relative to bottom decile plants) (ii) both hard and soft skills are significantly positively associated with TFP and (iii) in an accounting sense, the skills gap between the top and bottom firms in the productivity distribution explains about 8% of the TFP gap.

Session: 6a   Auditorium   Category: Category: Evidence Based Policy Fund Productivity Microdata Project

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